Arizona’s bioscience and health communities are rushing alongside their counterparts across the globe to find ways to hold off and eradicate the new coronavirus. 

From a new test that can detect the virus within 15 minutes to high tech robots that can sterilize hospital rooms, their work is contributing to a world stepping up to stop it from spreading.����

As of Wednesday, the had killed more than 2,006 people in China and three in other countries, according to the World Health Organization. Globally, more than 75,000 people have been confirmed to be infected. The vast majority are in China. So far, only seven cases have been reported in the U.S., including one in Arizona. 

Pharmaceutical firms and researchers in the U.S., China and other countries are pushing to find ways to prevent more devastation from the outbreak. 

In Arizona, researchers and health facilities are jumping in: 

TGen working with FDA to approve test to diagnose virus����

Flagstaff researchers at TGen believe they can develop a quick, accurate, genomics-based test that could produce results in as little as 15 minutes, and is easily used in a doctor’s office or hospital emergency room.

Development of such tests can take months; even years. TGen scientists are waiting on an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) so they can move their discoveries more quickly from the lab to doctors and their patients.

They are developing a test that not only can detect if a patient has a coronavirus, but also tell which type of coronavirus, which can be as mild as a common cold or the more deadly types like SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and the new virus, which was officially named COVID-19 this month. 

Currently, the only other available is being developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It received an emergency use authorization from the FDA Feb. 4 to allow more health labs to test samples. 

One test is not enough, said David Engelthaler, co-director and associate professor of TGen North in Flagstaff, who took to the airwaves last week to talk about the virus. TGen North is the infectious-disease division for the Phoenix-based non-profit Translational Genomics Research Institute that uses genomic sequencing to identify and develop therapies for diseases like cancer. 

“If the disease starts to spread and we do see large outbreaks in the U.S. like they’re seeing in China, it will be important to have a lot more than just that single test so we want to make sure that we’re ready to be able to respond and make a great as impact as possible,” Engelthaler said.����

TGen’s test involves collecting a sample of DNA from a sick patient, such as mucous from the nose, and using sequencing technology to determine if it is COVID-19.

“We’re going to be able to develop a similar type of rapid test but we can look throughout the entirety of the genetic material to not only say absolutely it’s this exact strain and whether it’s changing,” Engelthaler told KTAR News. “It will give information for both doctors and public health officials who are tracking this outbreak.”

ASU researchers developing vaccine 

In a similar race, three Arizona State University researchers are working to find a vaccine for COVID-19. 

In her lab at the Biodesign Institute at ASU, Professor Brenda Hogue, a virologist in the School of Life Sciences, specializes in the study of various coronaviruses and understanding virus-host interactions at the cellular level.

Hogue and two other researchers, molecular biologist Qiang Chen and virologist Bert Jacobs, are working to create different vaccines to combat COVID-19. Their different strategies involve changing an existing vaccine and creating a new one.

In a recent Q&A interview with ASU, Hogue said that it can take years for a vaccine to be available. 

“It takes a long time and one has to start from initial experiments. Small animal models, if available, are generally used before ultimately testing in primates and then humans. In the case of the vaccine development for the new coronavirus, it will facilitate work that has already been done for SARS and MERS.” 

Hogue said they are initiating work to understand several of the proteins that are common to coronaviruses that they have already been working on. 

“We are interested in what is different about the proteins in the new virus, compared to the other coronaviruses that we work with. We want to understand how the differences impact the functions of the proteins during infection. We’re initiating this work as we speak and will certainly share results with the scientific community,” she said. 

Honor Health uses germ-zapping robots to clean patient rooms 

Hospitals across Arizona like HonorHealth also are well prepared for any outbreaks. 

HonorHealth started purchasing germ-zapping robots a few years ago with the help of generous community donors. Today, they have 32 of the robots that will come in handy if the virus spreads. They can kill 99.9 percent of germs left in a room.���� 

Using high-intensity ultraviolet light, the small robots disinfect a patient room in just minutes. Delivered in millisecond pulses, the light is hundreds of times more intense than sunlight. The robot successfully kills germs, including bacteria, viruses, bacterial spores, and antibiotic-resistant superbugs.

“You can imagine how hard it is to wipe down every nook and crevice in a room. Think of the telephone, cords, bed rails and other things. The advantage of the robot is that its germ-zapping light penetrates the entire area,” Stephanie Jackson, MD, HonorHealth senior vice president and chief clinical value officer said in a prepared statement.

The robots were first used in HonorHealth’s unit for patients with blood cancers at Scottsdale Shea Medical Center. This specialized unit cares for individuals who are among the sickest and most vulnerable of HonorHealth’s patients, those with leukemia, lymphoma and other blood cancers. Because of their treatment, these patients have significantly compromised immune systems, leaving them vulnerable to infections.

Many of the deaths associated with COVID-19 have been patients who were elderly or  already sick or unhealthy. 

Meanwhile, the best protection is simple, health care professionals said. Wash hands thoroughly with soap, use hand sanitizers with alcohol and avoid touching the face with unclean hands.

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The National Science Foundation (NSF) has granted Phoenix College nearly $1.5 million to support integrating research, mentoring and industry collaborations to improve STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) recruitment and retention among minority students at the college. The grant comes as part of the first round of grants from the NSF’s Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions program, also known as the HSI program.

“The National Science Foundation has a strong commitment to promoting the health, prosperity and welfare of the nation by broadening participation in science, technology, engineering and mathematics,” said Dr. Talitha Washington, co-lead program director of the NSF HSI program.

Phoenix College had to meet a rigorous set of merit requirements to be chosen for the competitive HSI grant.

“All proposals for HSI funding go through NSF’s gold-standard merit review process that identifies which projects to support,” Washington said. “That process considers both the technical aspects of a proposed project and its potential to contribute more broadly to advancing NSF’s mission.”

Phoenix College is part of the Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD), one of the largest community college systems in the United States. Out of a total of 10 campuses, all of which are regionally-accredited, six are now designated as Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), and more will follow.

“What is really great about our colleges is that we serve a large percentage of Hispanic students, and many of them are first-generation college students,” said Robin Cotter, professor of biosciences at Phoenix College and one of the primary project team members who authored the NSF grant proposal.

Maricopa Community College faculty used their free time to form the grant proposal in the hope that they might introduce their students to more research opportunities that will better prepare them for the workforce, Cotter said.

“Many of us come from research backgrounds, and we know that helping our students make connections with industry and university partners is key to their success as they move along that pathway toward their career,” Cotter said. “So we decided to take our free time — we weren’t paid to do this — and we worked together to develop this application. It included faculty from biology, psychology, math, geology, physics; and we all worked together to develop this proposal that then competed at the national level.”

This is the first time this particular grant has been offered by the NSF to HSIs nationwide. Among the applicants were community colleges and universities, including Research I (R1) Universities — highly competitive research institutions. The grant will fund Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CUREs) for students at Phoenix College, and the program is expected to impact more than 3,000 community college students.

The MCCCD schools have teaching laboratories but no independent research labs, inadvertently withholding vital opportunities from students hoping to find careers in STEM fields. The CURE model inserts research directly into community college coursework.

“We decided that since we couldn’t give our students independent research opportunities, we were going to embed it into our curriculum,” Cotter said. “And nationwide, they’re telling us that embedding practical applications of knowledge is the best way to teach students and prepare them.”

Phoenix College is already partnering with local businesses and governments to create opportunities for students to build practical skills. At the request of industry leaders, the college is making workforce training a core part of its curriculum, putting students in touch with industry partners within the first two years of their academic careers.

“I’m really excited to say that we’re partnering with the City of Surprise and their water treatment plant,” Cotter said. “We’re going to identify ways that we can look for micro-plastics and other pollutants in our water system, and then we’re going to have the students work on ways of removing them in order to improve water quality across the region.”

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is another partner. Students who work with the USDA will look at the impact of environmental factors, including pesticides, on the survival of crop pollinators such as honeybees.

“The honeybee population is important to the agricultural community here in Arizona and nationwide,” Cotter said. “So we’re going to be working with the USDA, based out of Tucson, and the students will be studying what actually impacts honeybee health and how this can be resolved so that we can maintain these pollinators that are necessary for our agricultural community.”

One of the NSF’s goals is to gain a better understanding of how to enhance undergraduate STEM education at HSIs, Washington said.

“The HSI program seeks to increase the number of STEM undergraduate students, who ultimately will become STEM professionals,” Washington said. “It seeks to increase retention and graduation rates for STEM students at HSIs and to increase the number of STEM educators and students at HSIs that have little or no prior NSF funding.”

Phoenix College received the NSF grant as the result of faculty-driven collaboration between all 10 MCCCD campuses, Cotter said.

“We recognize the need to train our students for the workforce, and that it’s really built on community partnerships, and we encourage anybody who wants to be involved to reach out to us,” Cotter said.

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